by Texas Homesteader ~
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When we adopted our Mini-Schnauzer Baily several years ago, she was plagued by painful bladder stones. This condition also caused her to relieve herself often in the house, and her urine was sometimes tinged with blood. A carpet-stain nightmare! I’m happy to say surgery to remove her bladder stones was a success and Bailey has been a happy and healthy member of our household ever since. But that pet stain in our bedroom? Hummm…
Of course we tried to spot-clean the carpet ourselves with various purchased carpet cleaners. But even rinsing out the carpet to the best of our ability, the soap residue apparently attracted dirt over the following days until the stain magically ‘reappeared‘.
Professional Carpet Cleaner Fail
So we hired a carpet cleaning company to come give the stain a professional cleaning. They spot-treated the stain first with a concentrated cleaner, then cleaned the whole room with their high-powered commercial machine.
Although the stain lightened initially, it came back several days later. Soap residue again? Hummm…
So I went looking for a solution. We obtained a small *Bissell SpotClean Machine for treating carpet stains. It works by spraying cleaning solution on your carpet and then sucking out all the liquid back out of the carpet into another receptacle.
But instead of commercial cleaning solutions to go into the machine, I decided to go looking for a less toxic carpet cleaning solution. I knew I didn’t want to use soap because, well, it keeps attracting dirt after the stain has been removed. Heck, even with a professional carpet cleaner!
Simple Non-Toxic Ingredients For Carpet Cleaner
So I decided to use a recipe I found on wikihow online. It simply called for vinegar, water & salt. Oddly enough it also called for essential oil in the ingredients. But although that would smell nice, I can’t imagine that adding oil in any quantity would be good for a carpet stain. So I omitted it. Any smell of vinegar dissipates when it dries so I wasn’t concerned about that. So the only ingredients I used were white vinegar, salt & water.
We used our Bissell machine and our homemade cleaning liquid to remove the pet stain. But I wondered, would that stain magically reappear yet again? To test that oddity, I waited a few months before sharing this post with you. As of today, the stain is still gone, gone, GONE! Yea!
Here’s my disclaimer. I’m just sharing with y’all an inexpensive solution I was able to make myself that worked beautifully for a pet stain on our carpet using a small spot cleaner machine. The carpet in our bedroom is a light color and there was no damage or fading to our carpet.
But your carpet may be made with different materials and/or dyes. So please test this on an inconspicuous spot first to make sure it doesn’t fade or damage your carpet! Then proceed at your own risk. M’kay?
Here’s the recipe I used, and it’s the only spot-cleaning solution I’ll ever use from now one. Simple ingredients from my own kitchen to replace a plastic jug of chemical cleaners?
Yes please!
MYO Carpet-Cleaning Solution For Our Bissell SpotClean Machine
Ingredients
- 1 cup distilled white vinegar
- 2 cups warm water
- 2 teaspoons salt
Instructions
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Warm 2 cups water for 1 minute in microwave.
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To warmed water add 2 teaspoons salt & stir to completely dissolve
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Pour 1 cup vinegar into Bissell reservoir (marked) and add warm water/salt mixture.
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Swirl reservoir to combine ingredients and return receptacle to machine.
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Spray mixture from Bissell wand onto carpet stain and let sit for 15-20 minutes.
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Then using the bristles on the wand, begin scrubbing until no stain remains.
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Finally, activate suction which removes water & cleaning solution from carpet.
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When finished, turn fan onto carpet to expedite drying.
Want To See Our Natural Cleaning Posts?
- Why Complicate Cleaning?
- Grandma-Approved Cleaning Techniques
- Homemade Powdered Laundry Detergent
- Laundry-Scent Booster
- Cleaning Blood On Clothing
- MYO Gentle Baby Wipes
- Many Magical Uses For Baking Soda
- Make A Natural Air Freshener For Pennies
- How To Clean A Narrow-Neck Jar
- MYO Citrus-Scented Cleaner
- All-Natural Lavender-Scented Hand Scrub
- MYO All-Natural Carpet Cleaner
- Saving Your Fingernails While Cleaning
- Repurposing Mesh Bags For Scrubbing
- How To Use ALL Of Your Spray Cleaner
~TxH~
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~TxH~
C’mon by & sit a spell! Come hang out at our Facebook Page. It’s like sitting in a front porch rocker with a glass of cold iced tea – lots of good folks sharing! You can also follow along on Pinterest, Twitter or Instagram.
If you’d like to receive an email each time a new blog post goes live it’s EASY to Subscribe to our blog!
This is so helpful. We recently adopted a dog and are trying our best to train her but it’s hard and she still occasionally relieves herself…everywhere but the tile or hardwood. Our carpet has taken a beating. I have been hearing the same about stains reappearing with soapy residue that carpet cleaners use. There is a pet and urine removal treatment we used that is similar to your homemade recipe that finally did the trick. If we have to deal with anymore stain I am going to give your recipe a try on my own. Thanks!
Yes Lindsay, I think taking soap out of the cleaning solution was key in our success. The stain is still gone, months later. Yea! ~TxH~